THE NOT SO GREAT GAME BETWEEN TURKEY, RUSSIA, SIRIA AND THE USA

BY ISHAAN THAROOR   Russian President Vladimir Putin is pushing aggressively for a diplomatic solution to the Syrian conflict — and he seems to have found common cause with Turkey and the United States, two countries that were firmly opposed to Russia's Middle East agenda not too long ago. On Wednesday, Putin hosted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Black Sea resort town of Sochi. For more than half a decade, Erdogan has clamored loudly for the departure of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a staunch Moscow ally whose regime has essentially subcontracted its bombing campaigns to the Russian air force. Just over a year ago, Putin was accusing Turkey of abetting the Islamic State, while Turkish forces shot down a Russian jet. But now the Syrian regime holds almost all of the country's major urban centers and is steadily expanding and consolidating its control. The conflict that has claimed hundreds of thousands of Syrian lives — and forced millions to flee their homes — shows no sign of stopping, but Assad's position seems relatively secure. So Erdogan and Putin jointly called for the implementation of "de-escalation zones," which would better prevent direct clashes between rebel and government forces. Islamist militant groups such as the Islamic State or the al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front are not protected by these arrangements. "Turkey would have an important role in any bid to create safe areas in Syria for opposition groups and Syrians displaced by more than six years of fighting," my colleague Andrew Roth reported. Roth received from a source a copy of a Russian proposal presented to Syrian rebel leaders attending the latest round of cease-fire talks in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan. "According to the document," Roth wrote, "Russia proposed that 'the use of any kind of weapon in the de-escalation zones by the parties to the conflict shall be prohibited, including the planes of the Syrian armed forces.' " The zones, according to the document, would be located in Idlib Governorate in northwest Syria, north of the city of Homs, in eastern Ghouta — an area outside of Damascus — and in the south along the border with Jordan. For many beleaguered Syrians, this could be welcome news. But critics can point out that there have been cease-fires in Syria before — and they didn't stop the sustained and withering strikes carried out by Assad and Russian planes on civilian areas. Russian President Vladimir Putin shakes hands with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Sochi, Russia, on May 3. (Pool photo by Alexander Zemlianichenko/Reuters) Nevertheless, it seems that the Trump administration is backing the plan. "We spoke about this with Mr. Trump yesterday," Putin said, referring to what he described as a "very good" phone call with President Trump on Tuesday. "As far as I understood, the American administration supports these ideas." Putin also admitted that American support would be crucial to implementing any of these proposals. "The Syrian people have the greatest influence on President Assad. They are, quite obviously, split," Putin said at a news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday. He suggested that "without the participation of a party such as the United States, it is impossible to solve these problems effectively." Washington Post columnist David Ignatius suggests that Trump's apparent lack of planning for the Syrian endgame may provide Russia a useful opening. "Putin’s proposal may be an effort to fill the vacuum of any clear Trump administration diplomatic strategy for Syria," Ignatius wrote. "Much as Chinese President Xi Jinping made himself Trump’s partner for dealing with North Korea, Putin may be attempting a similar play for Syria. The benefits for Moscow would be reducing its diplomatic isolation and improving its image after getting caught red-handed interfering in last year’s U.S. presidential election." But although Erdogan, Putin and Trump may all be on the same page about these "de-escalation" zones, it doesn't mean the path ahead will be much smoother. Syria's divisions are entrenched and profound, and great-power collaboration can only do so much to ease the process. The cease-fire talks hit a snag Wednesday when a Syrian rebel delegation suspended its participation in protest against, fittingly, ongoing air raids in the country by pro-regime forces. A YPG fighter stands guard as U.S. forces take up positions in the village of Darbasiyah, Syria on April 29. (Associated Press) More significantly, the United States and Turkey are having a tense clash over strategy against the Islamic State. According to Al-Monitor journalist Amberin Zaman, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had a "horrible" phone call soon after Turkish jets targeted Kurdish units in northeastern Syria and Iraq on April 25, killing 20 fighters. The units, known by the abbreviation YPG, are backed by Washington and are crucial in the campaign against the Islamic State, but they are seen by Ankara as an extension of an armed Kurdish insurgency inside Turkey. "At one stage in the conversation Tillerson was kind of like saying 'Okay, whatever, you go your way, we will go ours,' " a diplomatic source told Al-Monitor. Erdogan and his government are frustrated by the United States' continued reliance on Syrian Kurds in the campaign against Raqqa, the Islamic State's de facto capital in Syria. "To tear down the black banners now fluttering over Raqqa is to write oneself into the history books," noted Aron Lund of the Century Foundation. "And Erdogan has no intention of letting his Kurdish enemy become the knight in shining armor who slayed the jihadi dragon and saved the Western princess, especially not since he suspects it might come with a reward of half the Syrian kingdom." In a radio interview Wednesday, senior Erdogan adviser Ilnur Cevik even seemed to threaten U.S. special forces and armored vehicles deployed alongside Syrian Kurdish units. "All of a sudden, by accident, a few rockets can hit them," he said. All of this means there's a lot more jockeying and intrigue to come. Erdogan visits the White House later this month — and he and Trump should have an interesting conversation.

• For more detailed analysis on the path forward on Syria, check out this recent online symposium involving Lund and the other Middle East experts at the Century Foundation, including Michael Wahid Hanna, Sam Heller and Thanassis Cambanis. The four analysts discuss how the Syrian conflict has evolved beyond a “war” — given the clear superiority of the Assad regime’s position and the disarray of the rebel factions — but has yet to reach a “post-war” stage where the international community and Syria’s neighbors can focus efforts on reconstruction and reconciliation. Lund envisions “a kind of frozen, unholy half-life for Syria in the years ahead,” drawing a gloomy parallel to Burma before its recent liberalization: “You could easily end up with that kind of half-isolated, internationally detested, and not very well-functioning regime, struggling to tamp down peripheral insurgencies, while feeding off of humanitarian aid, smuggling, and the war economy as best it can.” • Iranian President Hassan Rouhani got a welcome boost on Wednesday when his reelection campaign got endorsed by a former Iranian president. From my colleagues: “Mohammad Khatami, a pro-reform leader who served two terms as president from 1997 to 2005, is under a domestic media ban, and the local press is prohibited from publishing his image or mentioning his name. But the former president announced on his website Tuesday that he would support Rouhani, who is also a moderate, for reelection on May 19. His endorsement could help mobilize turnout for the incumbent, who is facing tough competition as he struggles to defend his record on the economy and respond to questions about the benefits of a nuclear deal struck in 2015 with world powers, including the United States.” • Two big developments in Washington: House Republicans plan to vote on a controversial health-care bill this Thursday — the third effort since Trump came into office to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare. The flagging GOP effort to reshape the nation’s health care system picked up steam Wednesday as leaders tried to address concerns about people with preexisting medical conditions. But independent analysts remained skeptical that the new proposal would fully address the needs of at-risk patients who receive coverage guarantees under the Affordable Care Act. Separately, at a Senate hearing, FBI Director James B. Comey responded to Hillary Clinton’s accusations that his actions caused her to lose the election, saying he felt “mildly nauseous” at the thought of it. He gave his most exhaustive defense yet of his role in politically sensitive investigations, telling a Senate panel that, despite his feelings, he had no regrets regarding his decisions about a probe into Hillary Clinton's emails.

A Yemeni woman inspects damage at a factory allegedly targeted by Saudi-led airstrikes in Sanaa, Yemen, in 2016. (Mohammed Huwais/Agence France-Presse via Getty Images) Piling on Two years of brutal civil war have left roughly 7 million Yemenis on the brink of starvation. Most of them are children — their eyes sunken, their breaths labored, too weak to fight heatstroke and disease. But the situation in Yemen is about to get even worse. The Saudi military, which has been blockading the rebel-controlled port of Hodeida — the gateway for almost all the country’s food imports — dropped leaflets over the city warning of an “imminent offensive.” The United Nations and aid organizations working on the ground are warning that the attacks could trigger an all-out famine, the likes of which the world hasn’t seen in decades. An offensive on the densely populated city, which has hundreds of thousands of residents, would likely result in widespread destruction and could finish off the port’s already-damaged infrastructure. There would be major bloodshed in Hodeida itself, but the effects would radiate into the countryside — controlled by the Shiite-led, Iran-backed rebels known as the Houthis — where many are living day-to-day on the humanitarian aid that passes through the port. The Saudis, who lead a military coalition mostly made up of Sunni Persian Gulf states, are seeking to dislodge the Houthis from the wide swath of western Yemen they control and reinstate a friendly government. U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis wants to scrap Obama-era restrictions on directly supporting the Saudi coalition, indicating that he believes military and intelligence assistance can break the current stalemate. There's rising alarm in Congress at that prospect, especially since legislators have not been approached to authorize direct U.S. involvement in the war. U.S. military operations in Yemen are currently limited to targeted attacks against suspected al-Qaeda members. The U.S. also refuels Saudi jets and sells them billions of dollars of weaponry, which are no small things. Human rights activists accuse the Saudis of indiscriminate bombing in its campaign, saying the kingdom has killed thousands of civilians and reduced much of Yemen's vital infrastructure to rubble. In a letter sent to Mattis on Tuesday, a bipartisan group threatened to introduce a bill that would “prohibit U.S. involvement in any such assault.” But even if they succeed, the Saudi offensive on Hodeida will likely go ahead — and politicians in Washington will have little effect on a catastrophe their country has played a major role in creating. — Max Bearak Palestinian supporters of the Al-Ahrar movement hold posters reading "Abbas doesn't represent us" in Gaza City on April 29. (Said Khatib/Agence France-Presse via Getty Images) The big question Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas came to Washington on Wednesday for his first meeting with President Trump. It was another chance to push for the creation of a Palestinian state and be feted at the White House; Trump, a notable Israel hawk, said it was a "great honor" to host Abbas and said he hoped to help "facilitate" a final agreement between Abbas and Israel. But even as he enjoys Trump's hospitality, the aging Abbas is deeply unpopular at home, seen as ineffective and corrupt by many Palestinians. So we asked Post Jerusalem bureau chief William Booth: How fragile is Abbas’s position as de facto Palestinian leader? "The quick answer is that Abbas, whom everyone calls by his nickname, Abu Mazen, is not very popular among Palestinians. Most recent polls have two-thirds of those surveyed wishing he would resign. "In the barbershops and hair salons of Nablus and Bethlehem, Palestinians in the West Bank will complain all day long about Abu Mazen and his cronies. They haven’t gotten the Palestinians a state and, worse for many, the regime looks tired and smells corrupt. "Nor is it clear just how many Palestinians Abbas really represents. Gaza is run by Hamas hardliners and their militia, branded a terror organization. The West Bank is run by 82-year-old Abu Mazen and Fatah. There’s no zest, no youth, no next generation. "But while Abbas may not be well-liked, he’s still The Man. "He was last elected more than a decade ago — his term ended in 2009 — yet he still runs the Palestinian Authority. Just months ago, in December, he reasserted control of his Fatah party by weed-whacking the competition at a party congress and keeping his geriatric allies firmly in control. Abbas is also head of the Palestine Liberation Organization, and the PLO is the sole negotiating body in peace talks with Israel. "His nearest competitors aren't in much position to challenge him, either: Hamas is having its own problems governing Gaza; former Yasser Arafat aide Mohammed Dahlan lives in exile; and Marwan Barghouti, while popular, languishes on a hunger strike in an Israeli prison while serving multiple life sentences for the murder of Israelis. "So if anyone represents the Palestinian people in Washington and the world, it is Mahmoud Abbas, warts and all. And that isn't likely to change any time soon."